#0691XS 'Highnoon at Le Mans'

Le Mans 24 Hours 2017, Aston Martin V8 - Corvette C7.R

Wanting to win at Le Mans is always a lottery. As a rule, there is at least one sister car in which three other drivers would like to enter the legendary list of winners. In strong years there are several, if not many, vehicles and drivers capable of winning in each category. The desire to be at the front is logically great, but hard work and diligence is not enough, luck must be kind. So if 45 minutes before the end of the "24-hour hunt" it looks like you can win - that's already an almost intangible luck. But when a competitor drives just seconds behind or in front of you - that's the height of excitement. Not enough that the vehicle will hopefully hold out, no now it's also a matter of seconds. The pressure on the two drivers, Jordan Taylor in the #63 Corvette and Jonny Adam in the #96 Aston Martin Vantage, couldn't have been any higher in 2017. Both had the World Cup penalty on their feet and 800 million television viewers watched their foot on the gas pedal of their spectacular GTE racing cars. England vs USA, Aston vs Corvette. Drama and madness, weary-eyed euphoria in the two team pits, the tension was evident in every face of the mechanics and engineers, co-pilots and managers, guests and sponsors, who were riveted to the monitors in the two overcrowded pits. And of course the 250,000 spectators along the route also knew what kind of thriller was on the agenda. The Corvette leads only a few meters - what a coincidence - after the last pit stop. Jordan Taylor holds the trump card of a one-second lead. But Taylor misbrakes in the second chicane of the Hunaudières. Toboggan over the green of the chicane and even gain distance and increase the lead. But the left front tire suffered. The creeping flat tire is becoming more and more obvious as a major handicap. Taylor fights his way through the Porsche corners with the lurching Corvette in the lead, and to make matters worse for him, loses the lead while braking into the Ford chicane – in full view of everyone in the cauldron of the Le Mans grandstands. The now much better Aston with Adams at the wheel overtakes in front of the grandstand and in front of the pits, directly at the finish line, the yellow Corvette in the last lap - under an infernal noise of the culminating speaker's voice, the thousands of English and electrified spectators - Adam drives the pitiable Jordan Taylor over. When everyone realizes that Taylor is fighting with blunt weapons, arch-nemesis Ford arrives with the #67 and also takes second place from the Corvette. What a debacle for Corvette, what an incredible last minute win for Adam and his team. The Aston box boils over completely. The cameraman stays on the completely insane Englishman for minutes. Understandable. What an experience for all non-Corvette fans.